An Innkeeper's Friend
by miekhead
Summary: Leena is introduced to the world wide web and finds a friend who knows what it's like to own an inn in the middle of nowhere. Lorelai/Paris and implied Cleena pairings.


A/N: Hi... welcome to possibly one of the strangest fanfics I've ever written. I thought what would be better than to merge two of my fave femslash couples? Let me know what you think!

oxoxoxo

Being an innkeeper and working for a top secret organization quite literally in the middle of nowhere was a lonely existence. Leena sighed and tapped on the keyboard with her newly manicured fingernails. Her mind seemed irrevocably blank as she stared with unfocused eyes at the empty email. Being an innkeeper and working for a top secret organization also meant that outside friends were scarce. So scarce in fact that two years ago in a moment of pure boredom, the gentlewoman decided to surf online and interestingly enough, found a friend.

Lorelai Gilmore owned a quaint inn in a small town in the south of Lichfield County, Connecticut. She was an odd woman, some would say the female version of one Pete Lattimer. Leena was always fascinated at the length of each message or email, and often her friend would jump from sounding mature and experienced, to sounding like a 16 year old who'd just had her first caramel frap from Starbucks.

What could be said about their friendship was that it hadn't started out as smoothly as either had hoped. The innkeepers forum of which Leena frequented was constantly attacked by a "troll," as Claudia had called it. Upon closer inspection the 'troll', as Claudia had suggested in the first place, only seemed to want to cause havoc and wind everybody up. Rather new to the internet community, Leena bit, and the two "argued" (apparently it was only one sided) about tourism and small towns until _TheHoffs68 _came clean and admitted that she was just joking and she agreed with everything Leena had said.

Overtime, Leena and Lorelai's conversations moved from being the proprietors of inns, to more personal topics such as love life, health, and so forth. Leena had created a whole new identity for herself – one where she didn't have to give herself away, or admit that actually, she wasn't much of a B&B owner, more like a houseowner who kept her family fed and warm.

Leena sighed and tapped again at her keyboard irritably. She was so used to Lorelai recounting her life stories that she often felt guilty for omitting her own. Lorelai had given birth to a daughter at an early age, ran away from her high society family in Hartford, and set up base in a small town named Stars Hollow, just west of the capital. Having married her childhood sweetheart and the father of her daughter in Paris, Lorelai not only went on to divorce him, but fell in love with her longtime friend and diner owner Luke, became pregnant with twins, moved out, divorced him and fell in love with a different kind of Paris all together – her daughter Rory's high school friend, one Paris Geller.

Leena remembered her eyes popping open at the email, then realized that really, she couldn't judge. Paris, it turned out, was an oncologist and spent most of her time working between Hartford Hospital and Connecticut Children's. According to Lorelai, she was a very sharp woman on the outside; wry, quick-witted and very passionate. She could outsmart anybody who got in her way and would do so with unrelenting zealousness. That said, Paris was apparently also a bit of a softy when she wanted to be and a romantic. Lorelai had told her about the times she'd come home to find Paris fast asleep on the couch with the twins nestled against her. She'd told her about the time when Paris told her she'd kept the Bangles t-shirt she'd received from the woman after all those years. She'd told Leena about the time Paris had organized a private Bieber concert for one of her patients at CCMC despite the fact that she'd rather see the teen-pop sensation placed in a life-sized pickling jar.

Leena chuckled at the memory and shook her head. Her life was far from straight-forward, and sometimes she liked to daydream. Sometimes she liked to imagine what it'd be like to have a relationship, raise some kids, grow old with the one person she loved.

Leena hovered over the touchpad with her thumb and rolled her eyes. Like that would happen.

Lorelai was honest, and charming… and Leena was at a loss of how to discuss her life. She got up and began to pour herself a cup of tea when all of a sudden she found herself completely and irrationally angry. She was furious. Gripping the cup tightly in her hand, she recounted all the times she'd been warned not to have friends from the outside world, not to date, not to talk to anybody about the Warehouse.

And after decades of being nagged by regents, Mrs. Frederic, her own family…well, she'd finally had enough. Storming back to the laptop she indignantly put the cup on its coaster and began to type. The email, it turned out, was now a thousand words long.

She felt like she'd just seen a therapist, a whole weight of turmoil sprung from her shoulders. She explained how she actually owned what would be described as a boarding house, cared for four adults who worked full-time, how the longer her tenants were away at work the lonelier she got. How she loved them like her own, that they were her family, and that she'd been in love with one of the 'IRS' agents for as long as she could remember. That she simply loved Claudia Donovan with all her heart. She explained how she was sorry she hadn't told Lorelai sooner; she needed to make sure she could trust the woman before she let anything slip.

Leena grinned widely as she pressed send and sat back as she released a breath she didn't even realize she'd been holding. Picking up her mug, she took a sip of her tea and noting Lorelai's online status, eagerly awaited a reply.

TBC


End file.
